ighbors are ignorant of the English language, which makes the Wakatsukis, who normally speak in English, very uneasy. Money is also very tight. In order to make ends meet, Jeanne's mother goes to work in a cannery, along with Woody's wife Chizu. The only bright spot is when they receive a letter from Ko; unfortunately, the letter explains how he has been imprisoned in Fort Lincoln, North Dakota. As the war rages on, anti-Japanese sentiment increases and finally prompts an order from President Roosevelt; it states that any Japanese posing a potential threat to the United States may be removed. Mama Wakatsuki decides that she must leave the Japanese colony where Woody lives, for it is too dangerous for her family. She decides to move with her children to Los Angeles; they settle into a neighborhood known as Boyle Heights. In order to exist, they try to sell some of their valuable belongings. With cruelty, the second-hand dealers offer humiliating prices for their china and lacquered furniture and scavenge like buzzards over their family heirlooms. Mama and Woody find work packing celery for a Japanese produce dealer. Quaker missionaries, called the American Friends Service, also assist the Wakatsukis. As the months pass, the remaining Caucasian tolerance for Oriental people turns to distrust and irrational fear. The voluntary relocation program to government camps becomes mandatory for all Japanese-Americans. Jeanne and her family members are given numbers, which assign them to an internment camp at Manzanar, just outside the Mojave Desert. Jeanne, too young to understand what is happening, thinks of the relocation as an adventure. Although no physical torture or punishment is inflicted at Manzanar, it is still a bleak place. The entire Wakatsuki family is stacked together into a small barracks; it is scarcely lighted and offers no privacy. Now in Manzanar she finds she must share a bed with her mother and be herded through the camp with ...
